On Thursday morning, participants met to discuss innovative instruments to upscale progress: financing, technologies and research. Parallel sessions addressed: public and private international finance; innovative technologies for land-use monitoring; financial instruments to mobilize domestic funding; and the role of science and research.

In the afternoon, plenary discussed a series of key messages, including:

maintaining sufficient productive, diverse and healthy forests is crucial for achieving the SDGs, and climate and biodiversity targets;

achieving SDG 15.2 on halting deforestation by 2020 and Target 1.1 of the UN Strategic Plan for Forests on reversing the loss of forest cover and increasing forest areas by 3% worldwide by 2030 can only be achieved through political will, individual motivation and concerted collective action, adequate governance frameworks and involvement of multiple actors;

land-use competition between forests and agriculture can be solved by a landscape approach to increase resilience; and

expanded research is required to provide practical pathways that support the development of evidence-based policies.

Some participants urged limiting the number of key messages to four, while others made suggestions for additions and revisions, including on: the urgency of addressing deforestation; focus on restoration; the contribution of indigenous and tribal peoples; triggers of transformational change; involvement of smallholders; and focus on actionable recommendations to target groups such as governments, the private sector, civil society, and the research community.

CBFP News

In response to charges made by the international NGO, Greenpeace, against the Ministry of the Environment and Sustainable Development (MEDD), Minister Ambatobe’s office has released a statement to clarify some aspects of the case. In a press release issued Tuesday evening, 20 January 2018, regarding Greenpeace’s allegations, the MEDD insisted and signed a statement to the effect that, "the reallocation of said concessions does not violate the moratorium on logging concessions in the Democratic Republic of the Congo".

In a bid to help Gabon’s participatory forestry sector reach its full potential, the Ministry of Forestry and the Environment has conducted a study to review participatory forestry with the technical assistance of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). The FAO’s framework for assessing the extent and effectiveness of Participatory Forestry was used to conduct the study. A validation workshop on the study was held from 21 to 22 February 2018.

Kinshasa, 20 February 2018. The Congolese Minister of Environment, Amy Ambatobe, has reinstated 6,500 km² of logging concessions that were cancelled in August 2016 by one of his predecessors, Robert Bopolo, on the orders of then Prime Minister Augustin Matata Ponyo. The three concessions which were reinstated on 1 February 2018 were awarded to the Chinese-owned logging companies FODECO and SOMIFOR.

This year’s theme for International Women’s Day is “transforming women’s lives”, and we also need to consider the transformative role that women play in steering our planet towards a sustainable future.

On Thursday morning, participants met to discuss innovative instruments to upscale progress: financing, technologies and research. Parallel sessions addressed: public and private international finance; innovative technologies for land-use monitoring; financial instruments to mobilize domestic funding; and the role of science and research.

The Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) Switzerland was launched in Bern, Switzerland, on 15 February 2018, as part of the global SDSN, a UN initiative. SDSN Switzerland aims to provide an environment to discuss challenges faced by Switzerland in the context of the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, as well as the Addis Ababa Action Agenda on Financing for Development.

The Adaptation Fund achieved great results in 2017, making excellent progress to help vulnerable countries adapt and build resilience to increasingly urgent climate change impacts occurring across the globe.